Or che ’l ciel e la terra e ’l vento tace.

NIGHT BRINGS PEACE TO ALL SAVE HIM.

      O’er earth and sky her lone watch silence keeps,
    And bird and beast in stirless slumber lie,
    Her starry chariot Night conducts on high,
    And in its bed the waveless ocean sleeps. 
    I wake, muse, burn, and weep; of all my pain
    The one sweet cause appears before me still;
    War is my lot, which grief and anger fill,
    And thinking but of her some rest I gain. 
    Thus from one bright and living fountain flows
    The bitter and the sweet on which I feed;
    One hand alone can harm me or can heal: 
    And thus my martyrdom no limit knows,
    A thousand deaths and lives each day I feel,
    So distant are the paths to peace which lead.

    MACGREGOR.

      ’Tis now the hour when midnight silence reigns
    O’er earth and sea, and whispering Zephyr dies
    Within his rocky cell; and Morpheus chains
    Each beast that roams the wood, and bird that wings the skies. 
    More blest those rangers of the earth and air,
    Whom night awhile relieves from toil and pain;
    Condemn’d to tears and sighs, and wasting care. 
    To me the circling sun descends in vain! 
    Ah me! that mingling miseries and joys,
    Too near allied, from one sad fountain flow! 
    The magic hand that comforts and annoys
    Can hope, and fell despair, and life, and death bestow! 
    Too great the bliss to find in death relief: 
    Fate has not yet fill’d up the measure of my grief.

    WOODHOUSELEE.

SONNET CXXXII.

Come ‘l candido pie per l’ erba fresca.

HER WALK, LOOKS, WORDS, AND AIR.

      As o’er the fresh grass her fair form its sweet
    And graceful passage makes at evening hours,
    Seems as around the newly-wakening flowers
    Found virtue issue from her delicate feet. 
    Love, which in true hearts only has his seat,
    Nor elsewhere deigns to prove his certain powers,
    So warm a pleasure from her bright eyes showers,
    No other bliss I ask, no better meat. 
    And with her soft look and light step agree
    Her mild and modest, never eager air,
    And sweetest words in constant union rare. 
    From these four sparks—­nor only these we see—­
    Springs the great fire wherein I live and burn,
    Which makes me from the sun as night-birds turn.

    MACGREGOR.

SONNET CXXXIII.

S’ io fossi stato fermo alla spelunca.

TO ONE WHO DESIRED LATIN VERSE OF HIM.